Uconn

Connecticut's Ryan Boatright, left, is guarded by Villanova's Tony Chennault during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Hartford, Conn., Saturday, Feb. 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Fred Beckham)

HARTFORD – The surprise isn't that this performance happened. It's that it took so long for this performance to happen. In the meandering and sometimes inspiring interim, the potential for UConn's not-so-secret formula to be exposed had been forgotten.

Villanova figured out the Huskies on Saturday and then added an interior pounding to hammer home the point.

UConn followed Wednesday's stirring upset of Syracuse with an equally disturbing 70-61 loss to the Wildcats before a season-best crowd of 15,165 at the XL Center. Villanova knew, like everybody else, that Shabazz Napier and Ryan Boatright are the keys to everything UConn does.

Unlike everybody else, the Wildcats were able to do something about them.

"I think we really did a good job on on them," Villanova coach Jay Wright said. "Those two guards are two of the best in the country. Doing the job on them was the key. We played them as a team. Sometimes we trapped them, sometimes we denied them, sometimes we switched on screens. We just had to focus on those two."

The pair combined for six points and Boatright's four were the most meaningless points of the game, all coming in the final minute. That terrible output – the worst for the pair since it combined for one point in a loss at Georgetown last year – only accentuated the fact that UConn (17-7, 7-5 Big East) got clobbered on the boards and turned the ball over a season-worst 19 times.

Some scoring from them might have produced a different result. UConn has been able to overcome so many obstacles this year, including being outrebounded by 31 at Providence, because of Napier and Boatright. With those two struggling, the Huskies needed much more than they received from everybody else. And what they received from everybody else was good.

Omar Calhoun had 16 points. DeAndre Daniels had 13. Even Leon Tolksdorf made a rare apperance and hit two 3-pointers.

All of that made coach Kevin Ollie lament the lack of toughness. Well, that and the 20 offensive rebounds Villanova (16-10, 7-6) secured that led to 20 second-chance points. Twice in a critical span of 1:30 in the second half, Villanova turned an offensive rebound into a 3-pointer.

The first time, UConn trailed by two before the shot. The second time, UConn trailed by three before the shot. After the second one, which came off the second of two missed free throws, the Huskies were cooked.

"It's more about being tough," Ollie said. "That's tough on defense, tough on offense, tough on the boards. Because when tough situations happen, you've got to have the mindset that, 'I'm going to get through this adversity.' I don't think we did that today."

That was apparent.

Napier and Boatright shot a combined 3 for 15. Yet, the pair didn't score a single point in the first half and the Huskies still held a 33-30 lead at the break because they were at least close in the rebounding department and Tolksdorf and Niels Giffey contributed 11 points.

Wright was left holding his breath because he figured UConn's two guards would get right in the second half. They didn't and it infected all of the Huskies. The toughness UConn had in spades against Syracuse was gone. Where did it go in the span of three days?

"It's hard to answer that question," said Giffey, who finished with 11 points. "I guess when you're coming from a game like Syracuse where everybody is hyped up, it's hard to find that focus. Focus always leads to toughness, the energy and hustle plays, the box out and rebounding. We had a good attitude. It was just hard to bring it on the court."

Villanova finished with a 41-25 rebounding edge and had as many offensive boards as UConn had defensive boards. The result was the Wildcats putting up 16 more shots than UConn, not to mention winning nearly every loose ball and simply pounding the Huskies into submission.

Such a game was expected much earlier than this. Maybe the Huskies just got it out of the way.

"I'm not jumping off a cliff," Ollie said. "This team has got a lot of heart so I'm not worried. But we do have to tighten some stuff up and we've got to get them playing with that toughness that we need each and every day."

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